Fortean London: Abuses Of Enchantment And Hailing Eris

Scott Wood of London Fortean Society highlights a few upcoming events that explore the supernatural, folkloric or otherwise strange.

Image by Victorian London in the Londonist Flickr pool.
On Sunday 17 May Story-telling in Hope presents a story-show on the Ulster hero Cúchulainn and the Crow Queen. Details say “She is the mistress of chaos, surveying the slaughter as he whirls in fury through an ancient yet still familiar world.” In other words, he’s a British Hercules, she’s a crow-goddess of death and disorder and when they met: IT WAS MURDER! Sunday 17 May, 7.30pm start, £6 entry, The Old Bakehouse, 1st Courtyard left off Bennett Park, Blackheath, SE3.

Still on chaotic crows, John Constable, whose shamanic handle is John Crow, is the keeper of the enigmatic Crossbones Graveyard site in Borough. He'll discuss Transgressive Shamanism at The October Gallery on Tuesday 27 May. John "explores the inherently transgressive nature of 21st century urban shamanism, and how art, drama and poetry mediate its expression". He will perform channelled (as in dictated by a spirit known as 'The Goose') texts from his Southwark Mysteries. Tuesday 27 May, 6pm start, £7 entry. The Ecology, Cosmos and Consciousness salon at October Gallery, 24 Old Gloucester Street, London, WC1N 3AL

In the past John has worked with actor, director and fortean hero Ken Campbell, as did the late Bob Hoskins. One of Campbell’s many japes was to put on a nine-hour play at the National Theatre based on Robert Anton Wilson’s Illuminatus Trilogy. Campbell’s daughter, Daisy Eris , is following her own unusual path and is now crowd-funding her own adaptation of a Robert Anton Wilson book The Cosmic Trigger. The launch party is fully booked but Daisy discusses her discordian play at the LOST Theatre, 208 Wandsworth Road on 20 May. 7,30pm, £2 entry, LOST Theatre, 208 Wandsworth Road, London SW8 2JU

Sweeping up at the end of all this giddy occultism is publisher, film maker and author Mark Pilkington, speaking on Magic, Deception and the Abuses of Enchantment at the London Fortean Society, in the cellar of Dirty Dicks pub, on 29 May. Mark looks at two secret service documents, the latter leaked by Edward Snowden, that outline how magic and belief in UFOs and strange Fortean things has been used in war and espionage. This article in not part of those conspiracies, honest.